The Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation, Amit Shah addressed the 89th General Council meeting of the National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) in New Delhi today, informed the Press Information Bureau (PIB).
In his address, Amit Shah said that the NCDC is playing a crucial role in fulfilling Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of ‘Sahakar se Samridhi. Cooperatives are the only medium for economic development of 60 crore population of the country, which do not have capital. He said that under the visionary leadership of Prime Minister Modi, since its formation the Ministry of Cooperation has taken 54 initiatives in the last 27 months to strengthen cooperative movement in the country and increase cooperatives’ share in GDP. These initiatives have special focus on strengthening the Primary Agriculture Credit Societies (PACS). It further aimed towards ease of doing business including computerization of PACS, model byelaws, widening the functioning of PACS to undertake more than 30 business activities like dairy, setting up of godowns, LPG/Petrol/Green energy distribution agency, banking correspondents, PACS can provide more than 300 services as Common Service Centres (CSC) and preparation of an updated data repository of cooperatives.
Significant initiatives like Jan Aushadhi Kendras, PACS as Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samridhi Kendra and PACS as Paani Samiti undertake the work of Operation and Maintenance of Piped Water Supply schemes in rural areas can provide sustainable income to the PACS and employment opportunities to the youth in rural areas, said Shah. He added that a National Cooperative Database has been developed with the assistance of State Governments, which will comprise of comprehensive, authentic and updated data of more than 8.00 lakh cooperative societies.
According to Shah, NCDC has disbursed financial assistance of more than Rs.41,000 crore in the Financial Year 2022-23 across the country including rural areas, and is further set to achieve 10 times growth in disbursement of financial assistance in the current financial year from Rs. 5,300 crore in 2013-14.
“With such an impressive performance, I am confident that the NCDC will be able to achieve the target of Rs. 50,000 crore kept for 2023-2024. It is a matter of pride that net NPA of the Corporation is maintained at ‘Zero’ with loan recovery rate being over 99% for 2022-23,” stated Shah.
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Lauding the role of the NCDC in helping cooperative development in the country, Shah said that from agricultural marketing and inputs to processing, storage and cold chain the ambit of NCDC has widened to include areas in keeping with the needs of the society and boost income of youth in the country. He said there are more than 8.00 lakh cooperatives in the country with 29 crores farmers as their members. Since its inception in 1963 NCDC has provided cumulatively financial assistance of Rs.2,78,378 crore to cooperatives including agricultural and horticulture cooperative societies.
“Work is on to bring uniformity in the working of the PACS, which have different by-laws in the country,” said Shah adding that most of the states/UTs have adopted the model by-laws on PACS drafted by the Ministry of Cooperation. The scope of work of PACS has been widened now, according to Shah, where they can work in 25 different areas like dairy and fishery and can also work as Common Service Centres (CSCs). PACS by becoming CSCs can provide more than 300 services to rural people.
Stressing that NCDC should focus on promoting the three new national level cooperative societies on Exports, Organic and Seed production, Shah directed that the NCDC should also be the first contributor of equity in the proposed umbrella organisation of Urban Cooperative Bank.
